because I love you…

When I look back at that time, his illness might have been getting his head. He became very abusive. Verbally. He started to write and post pieces filled with anger and frustration. He attacked me with unwarranted, baseless, unfair allegations and threats of separation. I remember not wanting to be at home, picking up extra work for the first time in my career. Friends thought that we were getting divorced. I was just trying to grasp what was happening and how to protect myself. It went on for a couple of months. We even went to see a counselor.

Soon after seeing the counselor, we discovered that he had cancer.

Things got crazy after that. Doctor visits, pain management, and the radiation therapy while I worked to keep our medical insurance. I didn’t have time to think about what had happened before or what would be like after.

Once his surgery was successful, and we thought his cancer was in remission, a friend asked me if I was leaving him. I remembered my past anguish then.

I didn’t leave and forgave.

Not because I rationalized what happened was due to the disease, but because he was, and still is, my love. When I realized that, I forgave. I can’t explain well, but that was that.

Did he ever forgive me for the sufferings that I caused? There must have been a lot in order for his anger to come out like that. He stayed with me until his last day on this planet. He must have.

But, who am I to preach about love and forgiveness? I have never experienced a real hardship.

Forgiving is for my health, sanity. Forgetting is… well, that could be a medical condition.

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Forgive and Forget?.”
“Share a story where it was very difficult for you to forgive the perpetrator for wronging you, but you did it — you forgave them.”

I also feel pain, a friend remembering this time, how terrible it was. I also believe it was his anger talking, when he was behaving so badly. Realizing this makes the hurtful things he said and did much easier to forgive. But please do not say about yourself that you have “never experienced a real hardship.” This period in your life WAS absolutely a real hardship. Fortunately for your husband, you were both strong enough and flexible enough to stick with him. I cannot imagine what kind of hell his final couple years would have been if you had not been there for him all the way to the last breath he drew.

I have thought and thought about this posting of yours. I am remembering several other friends who died. During the months (up to about two years) before each one was diagnosed with some kind of cancer, he or she had periods of rage. It makes me wonder whether bouts of irrational anger aren’t oftentimes a unrecognized symptom of cancer or other life-threatening illness. Or perhaps we know, on some deep cellular level, when we are mortally sick, and that subconscious knowledge makes us furious. Then, we look around for what could be making us so mad — but all we see is our ordinary life.